Earth Journalism Network

CHEN ZHOU

Biography

I landed a job as a journalist in June 2014. With an engineering background, I had an easy time in entering Environment and Technology Group of The Paper, the largest and most famous original news and new media platform so far in China. My reports ranged from environment, science, public health and food security. I once walked a few kilometres to the seismic centre in a county of Yunnan province. As my reports played an important role in helping people know the real situation in the county, I won Special Fund for Disaster Interview Reward given by Huamei Foundation.

In addition, in May 2016, I found an employment in environment & science desk of Caixin Media. I received the title of “2016 New Prominent Reporter of Caixin Media” and ‘ The 2017 Star of Caixin Media’. Among my reports, I once wrote a report about illegal land reclamation from the sea in Hainan province. Also, in the report, I listed large-scale illegal land reclamation projects by several companies including HNA Group and Evergrande. The report, which had a significant role to play in enhancing eco-environmental protection consciousness, won 2017 report award of Caixin Media and 2017 Tencent Media Awards of Annual Public Service Report.

In November 2018, I broke the silence about being harassed by the police and prevented from doing interviews in an article during the investigation of petrochemical leak in Quanzhou, which prompted an outcry on social media and a rare apology from the police, which were reported by People’s Daily, Deutsche Welle and The Associated Press successively.